Patients will remain hospitalized throughout this protocol. During this period, no psychotropic medication will be allowed, and abstinence from alcohol and other drugs will be monitored. Measures of craving will be obtained using: 1) ratings completed twice a week on the established Alcohol Urge Questionnaire (AUQ); 2) assessments of urge to drink (at baseline and under medication) during an established cue reactivity paradigm during which each patient undergoes an invivo exposure to his or her preferred alcoholic beverage. The medicated cue reactivity session will follow immediately after the Trier Test, a social stress task that independently induces urges for alcohol (stress induced craving); and augments subsequent cue-induced urges (stress-potentiated cue induced craving); 3) weekly assessment of alcohol related cognitions using the Obsessive Drinking Scale (ODS), a pharmacologically validated subscale of the established Obsessive Compulsive Drinking Scale (OCDS). In addition, measures of anxiety and depression symptoms will be obtained twice-weekly using the Comprehensive Psychiatric Rating Scale (CPRS). During the last treatment week, subjects will undergo an fMRI scan using established paradigms to evoke emotional responses, and to evoke alcohol-cue associated responses, respectively. Psychophysiological measures will be obtained in conjunction with the scan. Blood draws will be carried out on the day of the scan to allow for analysis of plasma concentrations of the experimental drug. The neuroendocrine stress response will be probed, using the standard metyrapone challenge test, in unmedicated state following the baseline CR session, and then again under active treatment or placebo following the fMRI scan.